Unseen (Will Trent / Atlanta Series)

product, and you walk away from me?” He took a step toward Waller, seemingly blind to the fact that he was taking his own life into his hands. “I want to move up, Sid. I been a good soldier, but I want to be a general one day.”
    Waller seemed amused. “That so?”
    “Yeah, that’s so.” Snitch jammed his hat back on his head. “I think I’ve earned some respect.”
    Waller took out his cigarette pack again. He lit a fresh one off the old one. “What do I get out of this?”
    “You know I’m an earner,” Snitch said. “You know I can do the dirty work.”
    “Seems to me you like the dirty work.”
    “You wanna get me wet?”
    Waller didn’t answer, but Lena shook her head. Snitch was pushing it too far. He was asking if Waller wanted him to murder someone.
    Waller flicked the old cigarette into the sandpit. “Let’s stick with what you know how to do. Double the order. Bring it to the house off Redding. We got junkies clawing at the door.”
    DeShawn offered silent high fives all around. The shooting gallery was the house off Redding. They had their probable cause.
    Snitch wouldn’t leave well enough alone. “When do you want it?”
    “Soon as you can. Shipment’s late this week.” Sid puffed hiscigarette. “We had a truck rolled in Miami. Cubans took two hundred K worth of Oxy.”
    Snitch’s inner junkie took over. “I get payment on delivery. That’s the deal.”
    Waller laughed. “Look at the big man giving orders.” He patted Snitch on the back so hard that Snitch almost fell into the swing set. “I go by the house at three every morning. Don’t be stupid and don’t be late.”
    “Holy motherfucker.” Lena laughed incredulously as Sid Waller took his leave from the playground. “Ho-lee shit.”
    Paul was laughing, too. “Grab your ankles, Waller. Get ready for the big pokey.”
    Eric cut a bugle of a fart, which made the men laugh harder.
    Lena groaned as she crawled past them to the front of the van. “You’re all disgusting.”
    They were laughing too hard to hear her.
    She plopped into the driver’s seat. She rolled down the window and filled her lungs with clean, fresh air. She prayed to God she wasn’t carrying a boy. Or worse, two boys. Twins ran in families. Dr. Benedict had told her they’d know for sure when he did the next ultrasound.
    Lena took out her phone and pulled up Denise Branson’s number. She could see the Chick-fil-A building through the windshield. The distance was too great for detail, but she could tell that Snitch was still on the playground. He had returned to the bench, arms and legs spread wide. The sunglasses were back on. Lena couldn’t see his expression, but she gathered he was feeling pretty pleased with himself. He knew he was safe now. The minute he’d gotten Waller to talk about the house, Snitch’s immunity deal was set in stone.
    Lena heard Denise Branson’s voicemail. She ended the call. Denise was probably in a meeting. Lena pulled up the text messaging and typed out a quick note:
Baldy will have package within the hour
.
    Baldy was their nickname for the judge who kept telling them no. Lena was probably being paranoid, but she didn’t want to take the chance that her phone was hacked.
    She checked over her shoulder. The men were still celebrating, trying to one-up one another with crass jokes about prison rape.
    Lena rolled her eyes as she turned back around. Mr. Snitch was still on the playground bench. The sun was in his face. Kids were playing on the swings in front of him. He didn’t have a care in the world.
    She hated this part of the job. The junkie had been caught selling pills to kids, and he would go back to selling them pills because the police had let him go. There was no way for her to sit on him, wait for the inevitable fuckup. No criminal would ever deal with Lena again if they knew she couldn’t be trusted. She would have to sit back and wait for Mr. Snitch to screw up on his own.
    Or maybe she wouldn’t.
    Lena pulled up email on her phone. She selected the Google account that she used for ordering off the Internet. The email address could probably be traced back to her, but she didn’t really care. She was going to take the advice she had just given Denise Branson. No cop should go it alone. There was no shame in asking for help. Besides, Mr. Snitch’s immunity deal was with Macon, not the state of Georgia.
    Lena couldn’t touch Anthony Dell, but Will Trent could.

12.
FRIDAY
    WILL STUMBLED OUT of the